Closer Than Rust
June 17th
Vespa Tsang
June 17th. 12:30pm
#building
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Unposted
June 17th. 12:30pm
I need to see myself today, so I went to the building.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
The biggest mirror I know.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
I put my hands on her smooth glass -
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
The sky darkened. A crack of lightning. I saw her. She saw me.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
Her: Planted. Rooted. Stuck.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
The noise of busy tables - hearty, drunken conversation. The clatter of plates. Clip-clock of the waitress' shoes. Children, men, women - heteronormative families, but that's ok - everyone's talking, laughing, eating pig, wiping cow juice off their fingers. Grease and gluttony. Barbeque. Delicious.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
#but #then
. . .
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Unposted
June 17th. 12:30pm
A whistle blows, the crowd thins out, noises die down... a rusty chain, a lock. Is that someone crying? The restaurant's shutting down. Closed, for good. The owners - man, woman and two children - their footsteps bleed into the distance... leaving... leaving this place. But, the building remains.
#steadfast #strong
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
#2MilesAway
: The remnants of an old mill - by a stream - stone - a pre-Civil War historic icon.
#4MilesAway
: The remnants of a railroad track, later rebuilt three towns over. The train never stopped here anyway - now it doesn't even pass through.
#8MilesAway
: Peace grove. Not everyone calls it that, but some people do. It used to be a plantation. More specifically, a lynching tree. KKK meet-up ground. But tarnished soil has been reclaimed - memorialized, transformed. It's called Peace Grove now - but only to some. Some who remember, admit, acknowledge, forgive, pray, repent, listen, honor... the past, themselves, this land.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
It was a Black couple who told me about this, but I saw a White man go there once too. He sprinkled a bouquet of flowers around the ground and he wept.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
#imWeepingToo
. . . . . . and thinking . . . because this is my country . . .
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Unposted
June 17th. 12:30pm
In New York, we have Ground Zero. A tribute to lives lost. A place to go and find solace - a place to heal and honor ourselves, the
#victims
- to claim our ever-present goodness, our redemption, the regenerative powers we know are within us, the strength to overcome the evils, inflicted wrongly upon us - by them, our
#enemies
.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
Us. Them.
But what if the "enemies" are the "us" - isn't that the case here? Who is this "us"?
What if the memorials aren't one centralized, commercialized tower of light - supported and condoned by not just really-almost-everyone but also celebrated on t-shirts, key-chains and bumper-stickers?
What if the memorials are every fifth tree, the "enemies" are among the "us" and everyone - everyone - is a victim, haunted by this shared past? Everyone walks with shame.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
Welcome to the American South.
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Pending approval
June 17th. 12:30pm
I'm looking at this building and she shows me all these things.
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Pending approval